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> Unless all of these devices are running a dedicated full time server that must be reachable inbound by everyone this is not required. I think this is a lack

> Unless all of these devices are running a dedicated full time server that must be reachable inbound by everyone this is not required. I think this is a lack of imagination. The fact that (CG-)NAT is in the way could be precluding the development of software that could take advantage of incoming/P2P connections. It's a form of (negative/inverse) survivorship bias: kind of like zoning for only single-family homes and yet saying "no one wants mid-rise towers/apartments as evidenced by the fact no one building them". The current rules/structure preclude any other options. When we went from dial-up speeds to DSL/cable to fibre we were able to have all sorts new applications due to higher bandwidth. Are there classes of applications that we don't / can't have because of NAT? We're stuck with things that often need a central server (TURN/ICE/STUN) and I'd like people to have the ability to explore a more distributed/decentralized Internet.

Bender 6mo ago
I think this is a lack of imagination. No imagination required. P2P works fine if at least 20% to 30% have ports open inbound. 70%+ need not have open inbound ports. Where this could theoretically be a problem is if a specific sub-set of CG-NAT users were the only people seeding and downloading something. This non existent problem can be worked around using a VPN mesh. Tinc is an open source VPN that operates in user-space and while not as fast as Wireguard it can do things Wireguard could never dream of such as user space mesh routing, always discovering the shortest path. The advantage of this is keeping ambulance chasing lawyers off the P2P/VPN mesh. The only imagination required is how to keep the network semi-private. In my experience this is running a semi-private invite-only self hosted forum. In reality none of this is required for P2P however.
- throw0101d 6mo ago
  > No imagination required. P2P works fine if at least 20% to 30% have ports open inbound. 70%+ need not have open inbound ports. Where this could theoretically be a problem is if a specific sub-set of CG-NAT users were the only people seeding and downloading something. "Seeding"? "Downloading"? I think applications besides BitTorrent could be invented and become popular. Even now, existing things like SIP and WebRTC would probably be much less onerous. > This non existent problem can be worked around using a VPN mesh. Tinc is an open source VPN that operates in user-space and while not as fast as Wireguard it can do things Wireguard could never dream of such as user space mesh routing, always discovering the shortest path. So you're introducing another layer of software because the underlying network does not have the functionality available (just like STUN/TURN/ICE had to be invented to deal with NAT). Here's another idea: have IPv6, and if folks want to have end-to-end encrypted communications, start up an IKEv2 process (that opens a hole for its port via UPNP/PCP), and we have IPsec (which is built into most OSes anyway) encrypted communications opportunistically enabled.

Bender 6mo ago

I think this is a lack of imagination. No imagination required. P2P works fine if at least 20% to 30% have ports open inbound. 70%+ need not have open inbound ports. Where this could theoretically be a problem is if a specific sub-set of CG-NAT users were the only people seeding and downloading something. This non existent problem can be worked around using a VPN mesh. Tinc is an open source VPN that operates in user-space and while not as fast as Wireguard it can do things Wireguard could never dream of such as user space mesh routing, always discovering the shortest path. The advantage of this is keeping ambulance chasing lawyers off the P2P/VPN mesh. The only imagination required is how to keep the network semi-private. In my experience this is running a semi-private invite-only self hosted forum. In reality none of this is required for P2P however.

throw0101d 6mo ago
> No imagination required. P2P works fine if at least 20% to 30% have ports open inbound. 70%+ need not have open inbound ports. Where this could theoretically be a problem is if a specific sub-set of CG-NAT users were the only people seeding and downloading something. "Seeding"? "Downloading"? I think applications besides BitTorrent could be invented and become popular. Even now, existing things like SIP and WebRTC would probably be much less onerous. > This non existent problem can be worked around using a VPN mesh. Tinc is an open source VPN that operates in user-space and while not as fast as Wireguard it can do things Wireguard could never dream of such as user space mesh routing, always discovering the shortest path. So you're introducing another layer of software because the underlying network does not have the functionality available (just like STUN/TURN/ICE had to be invented to deal with NAT). Here's another idea: have IPv6, and if folks want to have end-to-end encrypted communications, start up an IKEv2 process (that opens a hole for its port via UPNP/PCP), and we have IPsec (which is built into most OSes anyway) encrypted communications opportunistically enabled.